Golf is an internationally popular game played outdoors on a cleared, primarily grass-covered property between 50 and 500 acres in size. The property consists of between nine and eighteen holes on which the players play. In order to vary the holes, each hole has different ground elements. Thus, while each hole has a teeing ground and a putting green, holes may also have rough, water hazards, bunkers, and other elements to challenge the players and maintain their courses' playability, beauty, challenge and enjoyment.
Golf courses have grown in popularity as of late and with this increased popularity have sprouted not only new golf courses, but also a focus on maintaining existing golf courses. Golf Course Maintenance can be extremely expensive and complicated for a variety of reasons. For example, the grass, in order to remain green, robust and healthy over the golf season, requires treatment and attention including proper watering, fertilizing, and regular mowing weekly and sometimes more often. Other areas of the course similarly require attention, e.g., trees surrounding the course must be maintained and overgrowth prevented; bunkers must be kept neat and clean; cart paths and walkways must be kept in good condition, and ornamental plantings maintained. The majority of the cost of this upkeep is dependent upon the area of each of the elements and Course Components discussed above, as each has its own needs and costs.
All of the above varying factors make it very difficult for Course Officials to easily estimate or cost out the Golf Course Maintenance for a given course. Course Officials have limited knowledge of those locations of the course which players will frequent the most or the least and therefore cannot predict those locations where maintenance is most and least required which may therefore cause Golf Course Maintenance to be unnecessarily costly. In addition, there may be areas that players frequent more often than Course Officials appreciate and thus require more maintenance.
Many estimates of Golf Course Maintenance costs and the amount of resources consumed made by Course Officials are broad and do not take into account how small changes in the Course Components will affect cost and resource consumption. The present invention, however, provides the Course Officials with near accurate estimates of the annual maintenance cost of a golf course and the amount of resources consumed based on the area of each region of a hole and demonstrates how design changes can impact these variables before actually implementing the changes. It also tracks players to enable the Course Officials to put resources into the most heavily played areas of each hole. These features of the present invention are highly desirable to Course Officials and others who desire to create and maintain a cost and resource-efficient golf course.